msterdam, Netherlands - Dutch flag carrier KLM has complained about the quality controls carried out at Boeing's Charleston plant where some Dreamliners are produced. KLM said the quality control at the Boeing's Charleston factory is far below the acceptable standards and the airline was concerned about the following deliveries, Dutch aviation news portal Luchtvaartnieuws.nl reports. KLM expressed its displeasure to Boeing after receiving its first 787-10 Dreamliner in June. (airlinerwatch.com) Altro...

Don't get me started on the KC-46. This should have been an easy conversion of the 767 airframes to meet the Air Forces needs but it seems Boeing has had a huge learning curve especially on things like the refueling boom. There were issuess with the wiring, avionics as well as tool being left in finished planes - go figure! I see similar problems across the board with the MAX, 787 in Charleston and the Kc-46 with the company doing way too much outsourcing and failing to QC all their processes as well as each finished aircraft. They want to push another unit out the door for the good old bottom line. Most of all the loss of engineering expertise in both Renton and Everett in favor of the $9.00/hr. software jockeys in India is simply being Penny-Wise and Pound Foolish. Boeing is going to have to work very hard to recover from these missteps.

Boeing considers Quality Assurance to be a liability, inspectors on the floor have to deal with production management on a daily basis that are trying to meet a schedule. Managers performance is based on the schedule being meet and bonuses are based on meeting the schedule. I have seen know defective parts being installed just to meet a daily schedule.

The current FAA Policy of letting manufactures certify their own product, ie ODA, has let the fox in the hen house, this policy is also contributed to the 737 MAX debacle, should have never happened, Congress was a sleep again.

Unfortunately, this is VERY true. Watch the AlJazeera documentary on YouTube. On first watch, I was a little leery of AlJazeera but I checked into quite a few articles and, sadly, their story rings 100% true. I won't fly on 787's which is very inconvenient as I travel a great deal.

They've got a hell of a lot better reputation than Fox. Check it out. Over 10 years ago they went global and decided there was an opening for an internationally based, European style operation. Don't take my word for it. Watch the YouTube, the link for which is posted in a bunch of other comments, It is really well documented with comparative views...

What? You don't trust the al qaeda, isis, and muslim brotherhood supporting ruling family of Qatar to be honest with you? You know Qatar, the country where they stone people to death for being gay and hand out life sentences for writing poems they don't like, that Qatar.

Mark checked into quite a few articles, Roy says it's just as valid now as it was five years ago, and Ray says they are doing real investigative work. And whata-bout FOX news, huh? Huh!?!

It does not matter where the aircraft are built - it's up to Boeing to make sure work is checked, checked and double checked in every and all of their plants, before delivery. If workers are inadequate, replace them. KLM is right - safety has to be priority.

“Some examples about the lack of proper quality control are: loose seats, missing or incorrectly installed split pins, nuts that are not fully tightened, an unattached fuel pipe clamp and various missing parts.KLM blames Boeing for poor quality control, late delivery and inadequate workforce at the factory.”

Have a watch of the Al Jezzera documentary (now 2 or 3 years old) about the South Carolina plant? where Drug dealing occurred on the premises, sloppy work was carried out.. Boeing plant workers said they would not take their families fly on a SC built 787. Boeing set up the Union free plant in order to stop delays over issues raised over quality controls,fair pay for a days work, etc., etc., Boeing received huge State concessions also for building in SC.. Something Stinks in the Boeing ideology. All hail the share price and the stakeholders. Screw people safety coming on first. The CEO, the Board, All need to go according to Ralph Nader - and I agree with him.

Given that the Dutch (among others) are now complaining abut shoddy work from that same plant, it rather tends to support the Al Jazeera report. As a state-owned media company, it certainly deserves scrutiny, but in this case independent sources seem to be confirming them.

@JMARTINSON In fact if you see the docu, yo will see real people involved, the guys doing real investigative work, related to real issues. After seen so many lies for the past year, I think that piece of old info is still very valid.

Does the name put you off?? I find their news reporting on point. With no left or right bias apparent.. Most of the major Media outlets these days have a heavy biased viewpoint.. one glaring example is FOX news.. With conservative Billionaire owners who have a hands on approach this is unsuprising.IMHO Al Jezzera carries investigative reports such as the Boeing exposure doco, that other new agencies would not. for fear of being sued or stifled by their owners.

"Most of the major Media outlets these days have a heavy biased viewpoint" ... these days? As far back as I can remember, when there was only newspapers and radio, bias was prevalent. I remember my parents explaining to me as a child that the newspaper some people read leaned toward Republican and the competitive newspaper Democratic. The public has always been taxed with deciding what it believed.

No, I don't even know what it means to be honest.-------I find their news reporting on point.

Why? Being not as bad as FOX really isn't saying much, even if it were true. -------With no left or right bias apparent..

Left/right isn't the problem, east/west is. They have had US based on-air talent leave the network citing exactly this as the reason. -------conservative Billionaire owners who have a hands on approach this is unsuprising...

Why would the billionaire ruling family of a middle eastern country be any different? They openly support multiple terrorist groups, but they don't influence the content of their own media company? That doesn't make any sense.-------Al Jezzera carries investigative reports such as the Boeing exposure doco, that other new agencies would not. for fear of being sued or stifled by their owners.

I trust the news and facts and journalism from AJ 1000X more than much of the information coming out of the USA. Get outside the USA media bubble for a while and you will see how utterly broken and self-serving much of USA MSM really is.

What makes them trustworthy? They can't be objective about the country they are based in, the family who rules it, or the religion they base that rule on. It's against the law. A negative report could mean going to jail.

When a company that produces any thing that can effect the lives of people that use it ,there has to be a nature of trust in that company.For many years Boeing had that trust with them being heads and shoulders above the rest..Then when in the race for more efficient ,money saving aircraft was in demand and other aircraft manufacturers moving forward with their product and the share holders of Boeing demanding that their dividends not to be lowered,Boeing needed /wanted to save money in production.They laid off Senior engineers in Seattle and started to using cheaper engineers in India then they moved some productions out of Washington State where experience aircraft personnel worked to a cheaper area where they hired many non experience along with some experience aircraft workers and their Quality Control plummeted.

south carolina boeing employees are proud anti-union , happy to work for less money, and seem to be sloppy on detail and fit and finish. Will it take a 787 crash, based on bad build, to establish that fact? Hard to show pride in work when one works too fast at something not entirely familiar with.

Bill Boeing is turning over in his grave seeing what has been done to the excellent organization he built. The senior “managers” from McD D who run the show now have only one concern - share value. It shows in the product and the people left behind.

Going to cut to the chase here. There are little to no skilled workers in the South.I'm talking machinists, tool and die makers and other skilled crafts. I had a friend who worked in a Delco parts plant in Mississippi and it took them three years to replace a machinist. The non union plants don't have the apprenticeship programs that the northern plants have and those chickens are coming home to roost.Boeing isn't the same entity suffering these ills, the foreign car transplants have the same problems and issues. Takata air bag anyone?

I will take a long haul with them in 2 months... inbound leg PTY-CDG with Airfrance and return AMS-SJO by KLM. Instead of feeling enthusiastic about my first dreamliner ride, I feel this will be more like a survival challenge. It's sad to see how quality standards and safety is poorly managed today by Boeing.

Unfortunately, this is VERY true. Watch the AlJazeera documentary on YouTube. On first watch, I was a little leery of AlJazeera but I checked into quite a few articles and, sadly, their story rings 100% true. I won't fly on 787's which is very inconvenient as I travel a great deal.

Boeing is being slammed in the media following the MAX issue, so bad, that it's not even about the lives lost or even the fix anymore. It's MSM narrative execution for reasons none of us know for sure. A software issue is a coder/programmer on the ground who doesn't care about aviation as we do, and sadly that allowed a couple of fatal "accidents" on an otherwise brilliant, efficient, exemplary, single-aisle aircraft. Sadly the Boeing bashing media narrative continues, and is quite contagious judging by this comment thread. Sh-tty work at the at the other plant need be rectified, no doubt or denial there, but the end of the article just so happens to state (buried, as not to disrupt the driven, anti-Boeing narrative,) "On the other hand, KLM is quite satisfied with the operational performance of its Dreamliners. The airline has recently ordered one more Boeing 787 and exchanged its A350s on order with the 787s ordered by the other Group partner Air France."

I can't help but wonder if the negative comments about quality are union driven. That aside, being born in and raised around Seattle-Everett loyalty to the Boeing brand has been ingrained from childhood. I am sick to read about the current situation. Such a long proud history, and now this. I really hope they recover, but it looks like a long battle.

The original story could also be digested as euro centric Airbus agitprop. Without a detailed look at the alleged problems cited by KLM, how are we to know the truth? Anyone care to take a stab at investigative journalism?

Turns out the story on the dutch website cited by airlinerwatch was not sourced from a news release, interview, or inquiry... by, of, or to KLM. The info came from Boeing, who solicited it from KLM as part of their routine aircraft delivery and customer sign off process.

So basically we are supposed to believe that KLM would write "the quality control at the Boeing's Charleston factory is far below the acceptable standards" on the receipt for a new airplane.

I, for one, am not that stupid. Routine problems identified and fixed as part of the routine aircraft delivery process. Anything can be weaponized into propaganda these days. People around here just eat it up.

I have been down-voted twice in the last two threads that I have participated in. I failed to realize that Flight Aware is just another tool of the growing socialist movement. Down-voting has always been a way of silencing those you disagree with in Communist societies. Who the hell needs my opinions anyway? Adios muchachos.

Don't feel too bad, I few comments up I've been down voted so many times that you now have to click to see...my question. I'm probably not the first guy in the gulag for asking questions, and probably won't be the last.

I can't help but wonder about employees who complain about poor workmanship in their own products. If I did a crappy job, or observed my co-worker(s) doing one without saying anything, I sure wouldn't brag about it.